Mgr Basil Loftus—Catholics say "Enough!"

Mgr Basil Loftus is infamous for contradicting Church teaching on a regular basis in the Catholic Times. He is leading Catholics away from the Church and no one does anything. This seems to radically contrast with the treatment of anyone daring to stand up for the faith in this country. If you dare to do that, you are quickly marginalised and/ or silenced, branded as a trouble maker or a radical, or sent to Margate.

I wouldn't say that Dr. Joseph Shaw has made his life's work the documentation and analysis of the regular material heresy spouted by Mgr Loftus, but it certainly seems to be something like an enjoyable hobby. If you would like to read about it, follow this link. Mind you, he is not alone. Pump Mgr Loftus' name into Google and you are hit with a veritable smorgasbord of distraught Catholics crying out over the obvious and plain error being documented by Mgr Loftus. From our hierarchy—the silence is deafening!

Why is that? Well, he has been around for a long while and has occupied certain key positions, which means that he is in the know regarding certain people and things. Mgr Loftus will be allowed to keep his platform and spout his atrocious counter-doctrine for as long as he wishes. The last thing the hierarchy want at the moment is a bean-spiller in overdrive.

The Bishop's used to own an 82% share in Gabriel Communications, but interestingly it has now been sold for an estimated £160,000 to a consortium of directors and senior management, led by company chairman Clive Leach, a Yorkshire millionaire and former managing director of Yorkshire Television who is a prominent donor to the Labour party. The consortium also includes managing director David Bould, marketing director Brian Ayling and editorial director Joe Kelly - a man who started as lowly features editor on the Universe as recently as 1994.

Interestingly, Bould and Ayling are not Catholics, while Kelly, who edits the Universe, describes his faith as "a proactive philosophy for social and personal development" and writes for the Fortean Times, the magazine of all things psychic and supernatural."

We, the undersigned, write to ask you to end the scandal of Mgr Basil Loftus’ writings in both the Catholic Times (CT) published in England and read UK-wide, and in the Scottish Catholic Observer (SCO), Scotland’s only national Catholic newspaper. Week after week, Mgr Loftus writes in rebellion against the Catholic Faith. He has denied dogma; for example, on the subject of the Resurrection and, in the same edition of the newspaper, he undermines the doctrine of the Real Presence of Christ in the Sacred Species (CT 10/10/10). Mgr Loftus is, clearly, a material heretic and he is something of a hypocritical heretic at that:: while praising Pope Francis for “abolishing monsignors” (CT 24/4/15), he retains his own title of Monsignor. Surely, he should hand back that title, if he is so pleased at its abolition. Since the election of Pope Francis, Mgr Loftus has plumbed new depths in manifesting his hatred of Catholicism, communicated markedly through his loathing for the Traditional Latin Mass and his mocking references to “carnival costumes” - i.e. sacred vestments. He agitates for a change in the moral law by pushing the Cardinal Kasper agenda to legitimise divorce and “remarriage” and a recognition of same-sex unions (CT, 24/4/15). Mgr Loftus persistently falls into the error of creating false dichotomies between Christ and doctrine, and Christ and His Church, peddling the currently fashionable (but un-Scriptural) notion of a false mercy which amounts to nothing more than human sympathy with those living in what Canon Law describes as “manifest public sin” (# 915). It is a matter of the utmost seriousness that any priest is permitted to use Catholic newspapers to rail against the Faith, to attack and undermine dogma and morals and to insult sound prelates - Cardinal Burke is a favourite target, as is Archbishop Cordileone of San Francisco who merely sought to Catholicise the schools in his archdiocese and was subject to a massive hate campaign by the enemies of the Faith, as a result. In his column, Mgr Loftus blatantly misrepresents him, and is personally nasty about both Archbishop Cordileone and Cardinal Burke. (CT, 24/4/15). I wrote to Mgr Loftus when he threatened legal action against two priests in England because they had allowed criticism of his column on their blogs. He replied: “It would have been irresponsible not to have taken those steps to protect those who, in good faith, read what is published under the authority of a Catholic parish”. In fact, what Mgr Loftus writes here applies to the faithful who pay money to read the CT and SCO. The faithful purchase these newspapers in good faith. They do not expect to read heresy; certainly not from the pen of a priest and with the blessing of his bishop(s). The fact is, Mgr Loftus is an obstinate material heretic. He has had his errors pointed out many times, having been made aware of the blog discussions on our site (and others) so that, were he genuinely ignorant of the nature, purpose and teaching of the Church and the natural moral law, the truth has been made known to him by these means, if not by those few letters which have been published in the two newspapers guilty of promoting his heretical and entirely un-Catholic writings. Action to end the scandal of Mgr Loftus’ attacks on the Faith and true morals is imperative,and long overdue. The buck stops with the bishops. With due respect, therefore, we, the undersigned, ask you, Bishop Stock, and you, Bishop Gilbert, to exercise your episcopal authority and show dutiful leadership by implementing Canon Law. - canon 1369 springs to mind, although there are several canons that might be invoked to end this scandal: “A person is to be punished with a just penalty who… in a published writing…gravely harms public morals, or rails at or excites hatred of or contempt for religion or the Church.” Yours etc. Please do click here and sign the letter!

I wonder if cost is a factor in determining why the editor keeps Mgr Loftus on? One could speculate that if the editor pays Mgr Loftus little or nothing for the articles he might determine that Mgr Loftus' controversial nature actually increases the interest in the paper, fueled by the number of people writing in to complain about him (and this helps to fill up the paper - at no cost to the editor).

I suspect that the reason why the hierarchy don't do anything is that they may regard Loftus as a kind of Court Jester who most people would not take seriously - and also because the Catholic Times has such a small circulation.

A real scandal is that for years Gabriel Communications has issued bogus readership figures.

This is what keeps the whole pathetic operation afloat - because their advertisers pay according to their readership figures. And The Universe has dramatically increased the amount of advertising it carries - and includes features in its advertising section that are quite unsuitable.

This is how they inflate their readership- figures:

1. The papers are sent to parishes on a "sale or return" basis. But to save costs Gabriel Communications (and the Catholic Herald) just ask parishes to tell them how many copies were left unsold and then put the unsold copies in the re-cycling bin rather than returning the unsold copies to the printers.

2. About 10 years ago, Gabriel Communications asked Parish Priests to give away unsold copies of their papers to the sick & housebound rather than just binning them - and to sign a chit to Gabriel Communications saying that they have done this.

So they now claim that these unsold newspapers have been given to the sick & housebound. I am sure that most parishes still bin their unsold copies - but Gabriel Communications count these as having been given away and read by three or four people.

Popular posts from this blog

The legend reads:<<Oi Frankie, you have emasculated Congregations, suspended priests, decapitated the Order of Malta and the Franciscans of the Immaculate, ignored Cardinals...But where is your mercy?>>

Christians faced with the ravages of Bergoglio...Roma e' tappezzata - Rome is carpeted!

A source told me that the posters near the Vatican have already been covered up; but they ARE ALL OVER ROME!!

Newman, Letter to the Duke of Norfolk, Diff., II, 279-280

Here I am led to interpose a remark;—it is plain, then, that there are those near, or with access, to the Holy Father, who would, if they could, go much further in the way of assertion and command, than the divine Assistentia, which overshadows him, wills or permits; so {280} that his acts and his words on doctrinal subjects must be carefully scrutinised and weighed, before we can be sure what really he has said. Utterances which must be received as comin…

A few of days ago I posted about a new book called The Dictator Pope which has been really causing a stir as it claims to be the inside story of the most tyrannical and unprincipled papacy of modern times.

Now this was first posted on One Peter Five, which I love, but some criticise because it is a site critical of progressive catholic attitudes and modernism. Anyway some people these days dismiss certain sources because they tend to contradict their own agenda. I don't, as I have said here numerous times before, we are all parts of the body of Christ and that body has many parts (cf. 1 Cor 12). If I agree with everything someone says, I'm probably reading my own blog. We all get it wrong sometimes.

Anyway, I was concerned initially that this would be seen as a diatribe against the pope with an agenda. This would make the contents easier to dismiss.Almost read “The Dictator Pope”, of course it is all libelous gossip, the Church is not a dictatorship, is it? — raymond blake (@r…

Vaticanista Marco Tossati reports that even the faithless men who put Pope Francis on the throne of St. Peter are losing patience with his laissez faire, "make a mess" approach to being pope.

In his article on the AAS inclusion of the Buenos Aires directives, he remarks:
A cardinal of great renown, a former diplomat, who has served an impressive career at the head of Congregations and in high offices in the Secretariat of State, is said to have reproved the Pope for his actions [as Pope], saying to him essentially, “We elected you to make reforms, not to smash everything.” News of this conversation — if it can be called a conversation — has spread through the Vatican, because it took place at a high decibel level, which carried through the fragile barrier of the doors and walls. The cardinal in question was one of those who supported the candidacy of Jorge Mario Bergoglio in the conclave of 2013.Gloria.tv reports that this is most likely the Argentinian Leonardo Sandri, the…